Grand Am test Update
03-26-2009, 05:09 PM
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Grand Am test Update
March 25, 2009
Teams Shake Off Rust in Fast Homestead-Miami Test
By J.J. O'Malley
HOMESTEAD, Fla. (March 25, 2009) - Faced with a three-month layoff between Grand-Am Rolex Sports Car Series presented by Crown Royal Cask No. 16 events, 22 cars participated in a special two-day session at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
Grand-Am Rolex Series officials responded to the request of several teams by adding the test, which falls two months after the season-opening Rolex 24 At Daytona and one month before the next event, the April 25 Bosch Engineering 250 at Virginia International Raceway.
Unofficially, competitors in both the Daytona Prototype and GT classes eclipsed the current Homestead-Miami Speedway records. Observers clocked Ozz Negri, driving the No. 60 Michael Shank Racing Ford Riley, at 1:12.455, followed by Michael Valiante in the team's No. 6 entry, 1:12.511. The pair were quick for most of the session until Christophe Bouchut beat both of them with a lap of 1:12.421 in the No. 55 Level5 Motorsports/Supercar Life BMW Riley he co-drove with Scott Tucker.
In GT, three-time South African Wesbank V8 Supercars champion Hennie Groenewald turned in a lap of 1:19.140 on Wednesday morning in the No. 30 Racer's Edge Mazda RX-8 to lead the class. Dane Cameron turned in a lap of 1:19.226 late Wednesday.
All times recorded in the session were unofficial, and no records were kept of the sessions. The official track records are held by David Donohue in Daytona Prototype, 1:13.022, in 2008, and Boris Said in GT, 1:19.325, in 2004.
"This is very encouraging, because both cars are running better than they've ever been here," said Daytona Prototype team owner Michael Shank. "We're super excited to come back here. The motor problems that we had at Daytona have been taken care of by Roush Yates. The cars are running flawlessly, and we learned a ton. During all the off time we developed a ton of parts, and they've been cycled through both cars. But the best news of all is that both Mark (Patterson, co-driver of the No. 60) and John (Pew, in the No. 6) are extremely quick. They're within a second of the pro drivers in their cars, so that's what we look for."
Shank also said he learned a lot which will help the team when it returns to Homestead-Miami Speedway for the championship round Oct. 10.
"We're 100 percent better than we were here last year, and that's all we can gauge it on," Shank said. "Also, the guys can do those times all the time. The tire degradation at this track can be pretty bad, but we can still do our low times even with 60-100 miles on the tires."
Groenewald is riding a streak of three consecutive championships in the South African V-8 Supercars, but is also looking to make his American racing debut July 4 in the Brumos Porsche 250 at Daytona International Speedway. Groenewald tested a Pontiac GTO and Porsche GT3 for Matt Connolly Motorsports on Tuesday before joining Racer's Edge Motorsports for Wednesday's session.
"It was a lot of fun driving each car because they were so different," Groenewald. "I really enjoyed all three of them. We had the fastest lap of the test in the Mazda, but that was because I drove with a new set of tires. Yesterday, both cars had old rubber, because I could still run quick laps on the Pirellis despite the number of laps on them."
Now, Groenewald is looking to race at Daytona in July - and beyond.
"I wanted to race here even before this test and evaluation, but these past two days have really strengthened my feeling of wanting to come here and do it," Groenewald said. "Now, I'm looking to put something together for Daytona, and am working hard on getting a full season in the Rolex Series for next year."
Joining Battery Tender/Matt Connolly Motorsports and Racer's Edge Motorsports in the GT ranks were two Corvettes from Team Sahlen for Joe Sahlen and Joe, Will and Wayne Nonnamaker; a pair of TRG Porsche GT3s for Andy Lally, Spencer Pumpelly and Justin Marks; two SpeedSource Maxda RX-8s for Sylvain Tremblay, Jeff Segal, Emil Assentato and David Haskell; Robin Liddell and Andrew Davis in the Stevenson Motorsports Pontiac GXP.R; defending GT champions Kelly Collins and Andrew Davis in the Banner Racing Pontiac GXP.R; Joe Foster, Patrick Dempsey and Charles Espenlaub in the Dempsey Racing Mazda RX-8; and Tim Lewis Jr., Lawson Aschenbach and Kuno Wittmer in the Autohaus Pontiac GXP.R. Romas Kapudija and Mark Jurczyk also drove the Connolly Porsche, while Dane Cameron and Bryce Miller tested for Racer's Edge Motorsports.
In the Daytona Prototype ranks, Brumos Racing brought a pair of Porsche Rileys for JC France, Joao Barbosa and recent Rolex 24 winners David Donohue and Darren Law. Timo Berhard and Romain Dumas shared the Penske Racing Porsche Riley, Guy Cosmo (1:12.529) and Scott Russell co-drove the Spirit of Daytona Racing Porsche Coyote, Darren Manning and Bill Lester tested the Victory Junction/Orbit Racing BMW Riley, and Andy Wallace and Rob Finley split time in the Childress-Howard Motorsports Pontiac Crawford.
In addition to shaking off the rust from two months away from the track, teams were also gathering data for the championship weekend in October, when the Grand-Am Rolex Series and IndyCar Series end their seasons Oct. 10.
"It's good for me as a driver to know this track, because the season will all come down to the race when we come back here in October," said Bernhard, a two-time winner of the Rolex 24 At Daytona. "I hope we are still in the chase for the title when we come back here, so we've got to be prepared. This was a good test for us."
Following the April 25 event at Virginia International Raceway, the Rolex Series is in action the following weekend, May 2, at New Jersey Motorsports Park, before traveling to Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca for the U.S. Sports Car Invitational on May 17. All three races will be televised live on SPEED. For additional information, visit www.grand-am.com.
Teams Shake Off Rust in Fast Homestead-Miami Test
By J.J. O'Malley
HOMESTEAD, Fla. (March 25, 2009) - Faced with a three-month layoff between Grand-Am Rolex Sports Car Series presented by Crown Royal Cask No. 16 events, 22 cars participated in a special two-day session at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
Grand-Am Rolex Series officials responded to the request of several teams by adding the test, which falls two months after the season-opening Rolex 24 At Daytona and one month before the next event, the April 25 Bosch Engineering 250 at Virginia International Raceway.
Unofficially, competitors in both the Daytona Prototype and GT classes eclipsed the current Homestead-Miami Speedway records. Observers clocked Ozz Negri, driving the No. 60 Michael Shank Racing Ford Riley, at 1:12.455, followed by Michael Valiante in the team's No. 6 entry, 1:12.511. The pair were quick for most of the session until Christophe Bouchut beat both of them with a lap of 1:12.421 in the No. 55 Level5 Motorsports/Supercar Life BMW Riley he co-drove with Scott Tucker.
In GT, three-time South African Wesbank V8 Supercars champion Hennie Groenewald turned in a lap of 1:19.140 on Wednesday morning in the No. 30 Racer's Edge Mazda RX-8 to lead the class. Dane Cameron turned in a lap of 1:19.226 late Wednesday.
All times recorded in the session were unofficial, and no records were kept of the sessions. The official track records are held by David Donohue in Daytona Prototype, 1:13.022, in 2008, and Boris Said in GT, 1:19.325, in 2004.
"This is very encouraging, because both cars are running better than they've ever been here," said Daytona Prototype team owner Michael Shank. "We're super excited to come back here. The motor problems that we had at Daytona have been taken care of by Roush Yates. The cars are running flawlessly, and we learned a ton. During all the off time we developed a ton of parts, and they've been cycled through both cars. But the best news of all is that both Mark (Patterson, co-driver of the No. 60) and John (Pew, in the No. 6) are extremely quick. They're within a second of the pro drivers in their cars, so that's what we look for."
Shank also said he learned a lot which will help the team when it returns to Homestead-Miami Speedway for the championship round Oct. 10.
"We're 100 percent better than we were here last year, and that's all we can gauge it on," Shank said. "Also, the guys can do those times all the time. The tire degradation at this track can be pretty bad, but we can still do our low times even with 60-100 miles on the tires."
Groenewald is riding a streak of three consecutive championships in the South African V-8 Supercars, but is also looking to make his American racing debut July 4 in the Brumos Porsche 250 at Daytona International Speedway. Groenewald tested a Pontiac GTO and Porsche GT3 for Matt Connolly Motorsports on Tuesday before joining Racer's Edge Motorsports for Wednesday's session.
"It was a lot of fun driving each car because they were so different," Groenewald. "I really enjoyed all three of them. We had the fastest lap of the test in the Mazda, but that was because I drove with a new set of tires. Yesterday, both cars had old rubber, because I could still run quick laps on the Pirellis despite the number of laps on them."
Now, Groenewald is looking to race at Daytona in July - and beyond.
"I wanted to race here even before this test and evaluation, but these past two days have really strengthened my feeling of wanting to come here and do it," Groenewald said. "Now, I'm looking to put something together for Daytona, and am working hard on getting a full season in the Rolex Series for next year."
Joining Battery Tender/Matt Connolly Motorsports and Racer's Edge Motorsports in the GT ranks were two Corvettes from Team Sahlen for Joe Sahlen and Joe, Will and Wayne Nonnamaker; a pair of TRG Porsche GT3s for Andy Lally, Spencer Pumpelly and Justin Marks; two SpeedSource Maxda RX-8s for Sylvain Tremblay, Jeff Segal, Emil Assentato and David Haskell; Robin Liddell and Andrew Davis in the Stevenson Motorsports Pontiac GXP.R; defending GT champions Kelly Collins and Andrew Davis in the Banner Racing Pontiac GXP.R; Joe Foster, Patrick Dempsey and Charles Espenlaub in the Dempsey Racing Mazda RX-8; and Tim Lewis Jr., Lawson Aschenbach and Kuno Wittmer in the Autohaus Pontiac GXP.R. Romas Kapudija and Mark Jurczyk also drove the Connolly Porsche, while Dane Cameron and Bryce Miller tested for Racer's Edge Motorsports.
In the Daytona Prototype ranks, Brumos Racing brought a pair of Porsche Rileys for JC France, Joao Barbosa and recent Rolex 24 winners David Donohue and Darren Law. Timo Berhard and Romain Dumas shared the Penske Racing Porsche Riley, Guy Cosmo (1:12.529) and Scott Russell co-drove the Spirit of Daytona Racing Porsche Coyote, Darren Manning and Bill Lester tested the Victory Junction/Orbit Racing BMW Riley, and Andy Wallace and Rob Finley split time in the Childress-Howard Motorsports Pontiac Crawford.
In addition to shaking off the rust from two months away from the track, teams were also gathering data for the championship weekend in October, when the Grand-Am Rolex Series and IndyCar Series end their seasons Oct. 10.
"It's good for me as a driver to know this track, because the season will all come down to the race when we come back here in October," said Bernhard, a two-time winner of the Rolex 24 At Daytona. "I hope we are still in the chase for the title when we come back here, so we've got to be prepared. This was a good test for us."
Following the April 25 event at Virginia International Raceway, the Rolex Series is in action the following weekend, May 2, at New Jersey Motorsports Park, before traveling to Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca for the U.S. Sports Car Invitational on May 17. All three races will be televised live on SPEED. For additional information, visit www.grand-am.com.
